New Way to Check Out eBooks

This article by Katherine Boehret (@kabster728) in The Wall Street Journal (@WSJ) highlights the new ability to wirelessly download electronic books from your local library using the Apple iPad or an Android tablet. She writes, “OverDrive Inc. (@OverDriveLibs) released OverDrive Media Console for the iPad, a free app from Apple's App Store. With the app, you can now borrow eBooks for reading on the go with a tablet.” She goes on

You can already borrow an eBook from a library using an eReader, including the Sony Reader and Barnes & Noble Nook, but you'll need a PC and a USB cable for downloading and synching. Amazon's Kindle doesn't allow borrowing eBooks from libraries....

There's a major downside to borrowing digital books. If the book you want is checked out, you still have to wait until someone returns it to borrow it. OverDrive's licenses allow one book copy per person, so several people can't simultaneously borrow the same eBook. Libraries can buy several licenses for a title so they can have multiple copies of popular books for borrowing….

OverDrive serves more than 13,000 libraries with a catalog of 400,000 titles from 1,000 publishers

How do you see the free digital borrowing of ebooks from public libraries to be a positive development for book publishers?

Read this article in full.